It's not easy to make the SPLC's 'hate' list

In a letter published on May 6 ("Beware of SPLC"), there are several serious mistakes of fact.

The "link" to the Southern Poverty Law Center and a domestic terrorist is, in the criminal's own words, "I found them online, did a little research, went to the website, stuff like that." Hardly the stuff of conspiracy, except in the right-wing echo chamber.

The FBI still lists SPLC as a group it works with, check out their page at http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/investigate/civilrights/hate_crimes/overview, scroll down to "Public Outreach" and find them listed with other nationally recognized civil rights organizations. (Several federal agencies have removed various organizations, the SPLC included, from some pages. It's a policy of linking only to government sites. The FBI didn't "drop" them.)

The SPLC has very specific requirements for inclusion on their hate group lists. You don't make it just because you "oppose" them. Groups have to work very diligently to make the cut.

I've noticed that since SPLC has branched out from the Klan and neo-Nazi skinhead groups, and started identifying religious organizations as hate groups, that the right has begun vilifying them, in an effort to discredit. The SPLC was fine, until it started highlighting the hate coming from these groups. Now, it's an "anti-Christian organization."

As for (Tulare Prayer Breakfasts speaker Tony) Perkins himself, he has said, on the record, gay rights advocates are "going to start rolling out the boxcars to start hauling off Christians" (June 2014). "While activists like to claim that pedophilia is a completely distinct orientation from homosexuality, evidence shows a disproportionate overlap between the two... It is a homosexual problem." Family Research Council website, 2010. Both are blatantly false. This is why I call him a liar.

Perkins has also recently appeared on television, claiming the majority of Americans oppose marriage equality. That hasn't been true for some time now, and Perkins knows it. He just can't bring himself to accept the fact, and continues to lie about it.

It is indicative how quickly and often a criticism of a religious organization is twisted into charges of "intimidation and silencing." Conservative Christians have, as they have for centuries, claimed victimhood for themselves, whenever anyone challenges them. Our May 6 letter writer has fallen into the same pattern. My criticism of Perkins as the Prayer Breakfast's invited speaker is more along the lines of, "you could easily have found someone much more positive, uplifting, and Christ-affirming than Perkins." That your organization picked him, tells us all a lot about your real values.

Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin, Rick Santorum and now Tony Perkins. All brought to our area by local conservatives. Who next?